Posted
by
Soulskill
on Saturday March 28, 2009 @07:17AM
from the money-for-nothin dept.

CBRcrash writes "Apparently, if iPhone users decide that they want a refund for an app (users can get a refund within 90 days, according to Apple policy), Apple requires that developers give back the money they received from the sale. But, here's the kicker: Apple will refund the full amount to the user and says that it has the right to keep its commission. So, the developer not only has to return the money for the sale, but also has to reimburse Apple for its commission."

After bricking unlocked iPhones, kicking applications off the iPhone store that might even slightly compete with iTunes in the far future, filing a wave of patents on basic well-known computer science and openly sodomising iPhone developers in the city square of Palo Alto, Apple Inc. today filed a Form 8-K with the Securities and Exchange Commission declaring that it was openly adopting Evil(tm) as a corporate policy [today.com].

"Fuck it," said Steve Jobs to an audience of soul-mortgaged thralls, "we're evil. But our stuff is sooo good. You'll keep taking our abuse. You love it, you worm. Because our stuff is great. It's shiny and it's pretty and it's cool and it works. It's not like you'll go back to a Windows Mobile phone. Ha! Ha!"

Steve Ballmer of Microsoft was incensed at the news. "Our evil is better than anyone's evil! No-one sweats the details of evil like Microsoft! Where's your antitrust trial, you polo-necked bozo? We've worked hard on our evil! Our Zune's as evil as an iPod any day! I won't let my kids use a lesser evil! We're going to do an ad about that! I'll be in it! With Jerry Seinfeld! Beat that! Asshole."

"Of course, we're still not evil," said Sergey Brin of Google. "You can trust us on this. Every bit of data about you, your life and the house you live in is strictly a secret between you and our marketing department. But, hypothetically, if we were evil, it's not like you're going to use Windows Live Search. Ha! Ha! I'm sorry, that's my 'spreading good cheer' laugh. Really."

Developing for the iPhone used to be fun. It used to be about doing things the right way. It used to be something that you could sink your teeth into when the mundane chores of programming for a living got you down. It was something cool and exciting; a way to spend your spare time on an endeavour you loved that was at the same time wholesome and worthwhile.

It's not anymore. It's about money and control and refunds and chargebacks, telling others what to do and doing what you're told. It's about who can distort reality the longest or get the fanbois to shout the loudest or mislead the most people into a walled-in garden in order to legitimize the "Cult of Stevie.". Individuals notwithstanding, Apple and the iPhone store as a whole has lost track of where it's going, and has instead become obsessed with process and mechanics, money and control.

s/bsd/iphone/gmi; FTW:

FreeBSD used to be fun. It used to be about doing things the right way. It used to be something that you could sink your teeth into when the mundane chores of programming for a living got you down. It was something cool and exciting; a way to spend your spare time on an endeavour you loved that was at the same time wholesome and worthwhile.

It's not anymore. It's about bylaws and committees and reports and milestones, telling others what to do and doing what you're told. It's about who can rant the longest or shout the loudest or mislead the most people into a bloc in order to legitimise doing what they think is best. Individuals notwithstanding, the project as a whole has lost track of where it's going, and has instead become obsessed with process and mechanics.

I guess I should have put the <sarcasm> or <crymeariver> tags around it... because I agree 100% with you that this whole article was a bunch of disinformation. It should be bleedingly obvious that (1) the story itself is highly inaccurate - these terms were in the original dev agreement, so this is not "news", and further, that apple has said that it doesn't apply it that rigorously (probably saving it only as a stick for when some dev. really abuses users, eg: putting out spamware, spyware, or malware). But who sticks to either common sense or actual verification when it's so easy to go "OMG LOOK WE'RE BEING FUX0RED! It's just the nature of the beast:-)